


second chances are better homemade

by the_feeling_is_mutual



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types, Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: Gen, Grief/Mourning, Susan Pevensie Deserved Better, The Problem of Susan, susan gets to go back!, what even is this, wholly self-indulgent, you know what heck aslan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-26
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-04 20:17:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18611770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_feeling_is_mutual/pseuds/the_feeling_is_mutual
Summary: Susan Pevensie knows three things.One: she will never stop missing her brother and sister.Two: she will never forgive Aslan for taking them, for leaving her, for a lot of stuff, frankly.Three: she is certainly going to do something about it.





	1. First ingredient: Rage

**Author's Note:**

> This is going to get long.

Susan Pevensie cared more about her life in England, the one that moved linearly through time, the one she could spend her whole life in and not have it torn away by chance, and for that, well, she was punished. Wanting to be grown up, in Narnian books, was somehow such a crime that she couldn't go back. They didn't ask her about it. 

 _"Oh, Susan!"_ said Jill, apparently. _"She's interested in nothing nowadays except nylons and lipstick and invitations. She always was a jolly sight too keen on being grown-up."_

Susan heard about it, of course, in the way that things spread, and wondered if nylons and lipstick and invitations really were so bad. She was liked, now, and she had friends, and if she wasn't risking her life fighting battles in Narnia, and if Peter had outgrown it and they weren't needling him about it, what was the crime? Later, she will look back on this, and wonder if she stopped believing there and then. For now, at least, she takes her hurt feelings to her friend Min, who listens to her and says matter-of-factly, "There's nothing wrong with being grown up."

"Thanks, Min," says Susan with a smile. "If they can't see it, at least we can."

* * *

 When she heard about the accident, she mutters a curse under her breath. Of course, of bloody goddamn course it was Aslan. To have them taken away at one fell goddamned swoop- it was almost worse, knowing that it wasn't an accident.

She cries, when her mind finally lets her, sitting on a bench in the very deepest corner of an empty little park and sobbing into her hands. It helps a little, but it still doesn't take away the ice-bright spot in her heart that chants  _You could have been with them. If only you'd believed. If only you hadn't cared so much about nylons and lipsticks and invitations. You wouldn't have to be the only one alone, alive, a lost cause._

Susan doesn't know exactly when her grief crystallizes into rage, but it does. She wakes up in the morning, remembers they're gone, thinks  _God, I miss them,_ and then thinks, instead of  _It's my fault,_ something she's thought daily since the accident,  _Damn you, Aslan._

She feels noticeably better.

* * *

Susan writes them letters sometimes. She knows it doesn't do anything, she knows, oh god, how she knows. She doesn't care. 

She doesn't stop hating Aslan. All the pain and rage filling her melt into something sharp and deadly. She believes in him now. She has to, but if she ever sees his smarmy God-like avatar of a lion face again she will roll up her sleeves and punch it. No bows, no swords, no weapons Narnian or otherwise. Just a bastard lion and her fist, colliding at some point far off and sharp in the sky. After that, she'll hunt down her younger self, if she can force Narnian time to her will, tell her to-

She feels a familiar press of tears behind her eyelids.

 

Susan Pevensie doesn't know how to feel.

When she closes her eyes, she can almost pretend that Lucy's about to call her name, that they're all playing hide-and-seek in Professor Kirke's empty old house (she's crawled underneath a desk, bumping her head a bit when she sits up to get more comfortable) and they're in that comfortable moment just before everything went wrong (or right, depending on your interpretation). For once in years, she wants to be a kid again. She wants to find Aslan. She believes with a vengeance now.

 Professor Kirke had said not to expect to go back to Narnia through the same portal they went in. Well, she's about to try.

 


	2. Second ingredient: Determination

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Susan? In MY Narnia? It's more likely than you'd think. This chapter's mildly mature for some minor character death, and I've tried to be non-explicit.
> 
> (Also I've sprinkled in actual quotations. Sorry, Clive!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoo boy this was a spur-of-the-moment thing. Don't worry, the chapter title's kind of dark but I just needed a rhyme. Also I anticipate this getting a lot longer, so...
> 
> (Non-graphic vomiting mention; if you want to skip it, stop reading at "No, no no nonononono," and pick back up at the very next paragraph.)

Susan looks for months before she finds it; _the_ wardrobe, covered in dust in the back of a resale shop. All the other customers are near the windows, looking idly at glassware or poking at a set of musty encyclopedias. 

She steps inside, closing the door behind her. It smells like wood, and it's only slightly less dusty. Walking forward, Susan holds out her hands; if she walks straight into the back wall, at least it won't be her head that hits the wood.

She doesn't walk into the wall.

Instead, a pine branch smacks her across the face. "Mghmph!" she says, clearing the snow from her face. What do you know, old Professor Kirke was wrong. Or maybe she was just self-determined enough to break back into Narnia. Susan likes the term "break in" for this...whatever. It's less kindly than "visit," less epic-sounding than "journey," and a hell of a lot better than "return." 

Wait. Pine branch. Snow. Wardrobe.

Susan has been here before.

If she remembers correctly, that faun, Mr. Tumble or Tumner or something like that, should be somewhere around here. It's that never-ending winter she and...She and the others had first entered Narnia during that false winter. If everything else was the same, it was going to be quite a lot harder without Santa Claus swooping in and giving them all gifts of importance and convenience. Damn. They'd been drafted into it early. Aslan had a lot of strings to pull.

She walks further in, deeper into Early Narnia, as she thinks of it. She really should have brought a warm coat. And possibly snowshoes. And weapons of some sort; even if Lucy's already been here, it seems like it's up to her to get rid of the evil queen. It's not far before she sees a lamp post. The lamp post. Far enough to turn back now and pretend she never went in.

* * *

 The very next day, Susan puts a warm coat, a scarf, a very small gun (empty; she really, really doesn't want to kill anyone, but to threaten them would probably be helpful), and what she is mostly sure is a policeman's club inside a bag and laces up a pair of the sturdiest and cheapest boots she could find. As an afterthought, she puts some bread, some cheese wrapped in paper, and a small vacuum flask of hot cocoa into the bag and goes back to the resale shop. Inside the dark of the wardrobe, she fumbles herself into the coat, tangles the scarf around her neck, and walks forward until she feels the pine branches from before. She keeps going. 

She comes to the lamp post. She keeps going.

She doesn't stop until she sees a figure through the snow, holding an umbrella in one hand and several brown paper parcels in the other. He sees her, performs a flawless-double take, drops all of his parcels, and exclaims "Goodness gracious me!"

"Hello," she says. "I'm Susan Pevensie." She towers over him; the faun is roughly the height of a seven-year-old.

"My name is Mr. Tumnus," says the faun, "and excuse me — I don’t want to be inquisitive — but should I be right in thinking that you are a Daughter of Eve?"

"Maybe," she says. "What criteria do you need me to fit?"

"Well, are you a Human?"

"Yes, I'm human," says Susan, "and in addition to being human, I am also extremely cold out here. Could you point me in the direction of the Queen of Narnia? I have something I'd like to say to her. With great force."

"Wh-" says Mr. Tumnus, but she's already striding off into the trees. As she quickens her steps, she hears an "Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear" behind her. She doesn't turn around.

 

* * *

 

The Queen of Narnia is just as beautiful and terrible as she was when Susan was twelve. At this point, however, Susan is...much, much better at dealing with adults, being one herself. At this point, she looks anemic, her mouth too red against her unpleasantly chalky skin. 

Susan adjusts the bag more firmly over her shoulder and walks straight up to her. The Queen, sitting tall in her oversized, white-and-gold carriage, pretends not to notice. 

"May we have a chat?" Pleasantries be damned, Susan is going to enter this battle of words (and possibly fists) fully armed and ready. "Adult to adult, woman to woman."

The Queen gives her a long look. At last she says, "And what, pray, are you?"

"I'm a Pevensie," says Susan.

"Is that how you address a Queen?"

"I'm not sure," says Susan. "I haven't ever been lucky enough to meet Her Majesty, and I forgot what was written in the etiquette books." She knows this is stupid. She knows, very much so, that she will probably die if she keeps going on like this. Maybe Aslan will let her in this time.

The Queen looks at her again. "What are you?"

"I'm Susan, a human."

"A Daughter of Eve?"

"I assume so," says Susan, getting into the carriage.

"Drive onward," says the Queen coldly.

"And what are you?"

"Why should I answer to you?"

"Because I have  _this_." Susan pulls the empty gun out of her bag and hopes to whatever deity (that isn't Aslan) that may be watching that her stupid, stupid, stupid bluff will pay off.

"What is that?" asks the Queen. Her voice has lost a little of its stern tone and sounds almost...curious?

"A device," says Susan. She throws it into the snow and watches it sink quickly into a deep snowdrift. "I won't need it."

"What do you mean you won't need it?" 

Susan grabs the Queen by her shoulders.

"What do you think you're doing?" spits the Queen, wriggling like an eel.

"I have made plenty of terrible decisions in my life," she says, pushing the Queen backwards. The carriage is hurtling through the woods at breakneck speed now. "But this-" she wrestles the surprisingly light, but strong Queen back until she's hanging over the edge of the carriage. Susan feels at once very tired and strong enough to throw Aslan. "This is not one of them." The Queen has pulled out a stone knife now, from who knows where in her robes, and has it pushed straight against Susan's neck.

"Maybe it is," says the Queen smugly, pressing the knife harder against Susan's neck. She feels it break the skin. The Queen keeps pressing. Susan tries to jerk her neck back, but it's suddenly hard to move. She should have gone for the wand.

"Go to hell," she says. "Go to hell, and wherever I end up going I'll walk past you and think  _Well, I'm certainly glad that's not me._ "

She shoves the Queen off. The knife, somehow, sticks to her throat.

The Queen doesn't fall, at first. She hangs grimly on. Susan closes her eyes, feels for the club in her bag, and hits out blindly at what might be fingers. She hears the wood strike metal with a loud  _clangggg_ and opens her eyes to see the Queen falling. 

There's a sickening crack, when she hits the ground, that Susan hopes is the wand. 

The dwarf has turned, now, and is trying to control the reins and attack Susan at the same time. Dream-like, Susan watches her hand reach out and hit him on the top of the head. She picks up his concussed body (don't think about how he feels like a child, she tells herself, don't you dare think of it) and rolls him to the side of the carriage. 

The reindeer keep going, which is very good, since she doesn't know how to control them. Her hand reaches up and tries to pull the stone knife away from her throat. It doesn't go.

"No, no no nonononono," she whispers to herself. Can she melt the damn thing off? Would pouring hot cocoa on it only be a waste and blister her neck? Will the reindeer keep driving until they wear out? The dwarf will try to kill her anyway, if she keeps him there. Susan rolls the dwarf off over the side and is violently sick after him. The knife doesn't cut into her throat as she heaves, which is a blessing.

"Er, reindeer!" she shouts. "I have no idea if you can understand me or if this makes no difference, but please, can you take me to Cair Paravel?"

The reindeer turn, they actually  _turn_ , and Susan may feel like crying right now but at least the reindeer seem to know where to go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (What happens in that little chunk if you skipped it: Susan considers melting the knife off, ejects the dwarf, and then has to come to terms with the fact that she's just thrown two people out of a carriage.)
> 
> Well, that was short! Future chapters will probably be bite-size like this, so if this gets up to a million chapters, don't be daunted!


	3. Third ingredient: Hope (with a small dash of pain)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Some people," says Susan, "can't believe all their lives. Some people have to grow up, and quickly. Some people- but of course it doesn't matter to you what some people have to do."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One (1) swear in this.

The reindeer take Susan to Cair Paravel. She unhooks the reins and dumps every bit of horse-driving equipment into the carriage.

"Er, you can go now," she says. The reindeer stare at her for a long moment, than disappear back into the woods. The snow seems to be melting, which Susan thinks is a good sign.

* * *

 

The sky is cloudy, and the surf on the beach washes up over and over, each salty-smelling swoosh a reminder of when she sat on the throne. She enters by the east door, the one looking out onto the sea, and walks through the echoing, empty hall.

The thrones are covered with dust. She writes Peter's name on his throne, a clear spot that dislodges more dust and makes her sneeze. Then she writes Edmund's name on his throne, and Lucy's name on hers, and brushes her own throne off and sits on it to have a good cry.

_Once a queen, always a queen,_ she remembers. It probably isn't true. Narnia isn't dependable like that.

She can feel someone else in the room before she even sees Aslan.

"I'd like an apology, you know."

"For what?"

"When you told all of us that we couldn't go back, I was the only one who said 'well, alright, fine, I can cope with that' _._ I was the only goddamn one who moved on with my life, I was the only fucking one who didn't cling to a half-bit of hope thinking that maybe if I was good enough, you'd be kind enough to let me back in!""

She hiccups, her shoulders shaking. At last, after a long silence from Aslan, she says "I'm sorry for that."

"Don't be," says Aslan.  
  
"No, I don't think you understand. I'm sorry for blowing up like that. What I meant to do- what I meant to do was ask you why you thought a good way to punish me was to take everything I had left in the world and leave me. They're all feasting and joy-ing and cheering each other in Narnian heaven and I know for a simple fact that they've all forgotten me. I forgot my own mother's name. I forgot my own birthday. I forgot everything, and then I came back and remembered! But they aren't coming back. They won't remember."

Aslan doesn't say anything.

"Some people," says Susan, "can't believe all their lives. Some people have to grow up, and quickly. Some people- but of course it doesn't matter to you what some people have to do."

"Daughter of Eve-" says Aslan.

"Stop calling me that!" says Susan. "Stop calling me anything. I'm just Susan now." She takes a deep breath. "I'd like you to go now. I can't try to rule a country when its godlike figure and I are totally at arms with each other. Go to Calormen, or wherever you have to go. Isn't there some child you need to save? Isn't there something you need to take away?"

Aslan turns to go. It's strange, that he's listening to her, that he's not dismissing her out of hand, or making sure she believes in him.

"Please," she says softly. Her voice breaks. "Say hello to them for me. Tell them Susan misses them. Tell them she wants a second chance. Tell them...tell them she's doing alright on her own, but it's hard to rule alone after being one of four. I probably can't trust you like I did, but please. Please do this for me."

He nods his giant lion's head. She turns away.

With a clink, the stone knife falls onto the throne. Is it Aslan that made it drop? Was it just going to hang on until it couldn't anymore and fall?

Susan waits until she's sure Aslan is gone and throws it far into the sea.

* * *

The frozen people in the garden are all alive again now. Aslan, or Susan? Who's behind all this? She doesn't bother asking.

"Citizens of Narnia," she says. "The White Witch is dead. I'm your new ruler, I think. I'm a human. The Witch probably still has her army and everything in places, and I'm no great shakes at fighting, so. We'll figure this out as we go. If I do something wrong, tell me. If I am doing something right, tell me. We're all in this together, now, and I don't want to leave any of you behind."

If she's crying a little bit by the end of her speech, most of the Narnians are tactful enough not to mention it.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Probably just going to be an epilogue after this.


	4. bake under high heat and pressure until done

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Susan rules. The others remember, a bit.

Susan still has trouble adjusting. Sometimes she'll wake up and hit out blindly for an alarm clock, since Min'll be SO mad if she wakes her up again and they'd only gotten that apartment with their combined salaries so Susan could get out of that terrible old boarding house slash bed and breakfast and Min could stop rooming with her parents- and then it hits her. There's no Min here. She can't remember to kick her boots into a corner so she won't trip on them in the morning. There's no point in wearing socks to bed so she can go brush her hair in the morning and not freeze her feet in the bathroom, there's no reason to remember what's on the grocery list because if she goes one day more without milk in her coffee she'll scream, there's no Jimmy to go to that little restaurant around the corner with her after work and flirt over a hot meal. 

Other days, it's easier. She wakes up full of vim and vigor, ready to talk to the Calormenes and to make diplomatic envoys and to be a good, responsible ruler. To work on finding a way to elect sub-rulers of the districts and city-states of Narnia.

When she'd been twelve, growing up with alarming speed in Narnia, as she remembers it, she hadn't made a proper decision for a very long time, until about eighteen or so. She'd been Susan the Gentle, with long black hair that fell to her feet. Now, she keeps it at a manageable shoulder-length, long enough to tie up or take down as necessary, and she's probably Susan the Annoying now. She laughs for a second, thinking about it. 

"Hm?" says her advisor, a sensible woman named Jaera.

"Oh, nothing," says Susan.

"It's the first time I've heard you laugh in a while, Lady Susan." Jaera looks genuinely surprised and pleased to hear it, and Susan feels comfortable for the first time in a very long time.

The next day, she smiles at a terrible joke that a visiting centaur makes. The day after that, Cor and Corin visit, and all three of them break down into fits of laughter.

Jaera smiles wide behind them as she watches Susan wipe tears of laughter from her eyes.

* * *

 

True to his word, Aslan tells the Seven what Susan wanted him to say.

"Susan?" Lucy says.

"Who?" says Peter.

Aslan doesn't go back to Susan to tell her this. From what he's seen from afar, she's doing quite a good job on her own. He doesn't want a repeat of what happened in the throne room.

* * *

 

Let Jimmy wait for her forever after work, thinks Susan. Let Min sell every ounce of stuff that used to be Susan's so she can afford the rent (okay, Susan does feel quite bad about that). Let them live their lives.

She's living her own.

When she dies, who knows what will happen? Will she join the Seven? Will she go back to Min's world? Will she go somewhere else entirely?

Right now, as she and Jaera work out the best way to improve infrastructure in the cities, she doesn't care. She will in the future, and she knows that. But right now? Sitting in the sun, poring over a neatly-drawn map with a reliable, dependable friend by her side and the promise of anything in the days to come? She's okay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this was a short and wild ride! Find me on my tumblr @the-feeling-is-mutual if you wanna yell at me.

**Author's Note:**

> #SusanDeservedBetter2k19
> 
> Seriously, comments and kudos are a dream come true for me. Yell at me or hit me up for more on my tumblr @the-feeling-is-mutual (https://the-feeling-is-mutual.tumblr.com/)


End file.
